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Julian Assange stands by his decision to face trial now that Chelsea Manning is being released

Julian Assange stands by his decision to face trial now that Chelsea Manning is being released
Julian Assange stands by his decision to face trial now that Chelsea Manning is being released Julian Assange stands by his decision to face trial now that Chelsea Manning is being released

Julian Assange has said he stands by his offer to go to the US now that Chelsea Manning is being given clemency.

Speaking from the Ecuadorian embassy in London through Twitter’s Periscope, the WikiLeaks founder said there would be “many discussions” on his future before Manning leaves prison in May.

Back in September, Assange indicated he would agree to extradition if Manning, a former intelligence analyst who said she had passed on government and military documents to raise awareness about the impact of war, was freed:

A statement WikiLeaks reiterated last week:

With Barack Obama using his final days in the White House to allow high-profile whistleblower Manning to be freed nearly 30 years early, Twitter users mostly had one question:

Responding to the queries, Assange said: “I stand by everything I said, including the offer to go to the United States if Chelsea Manning’s sentence was commuted. It is not going to be commuted until May – we can have many discussions to that point.“I have always been willing to go to the United States provided my rights are respected.”Assange said there has been a seven-year-long attempt to build a prosecution against him and WikiLeaks in the US, and his name is on several warrants and subpoenas.“As of this year it is active and ongoing,” he said.He added if it took him going to the US to “flush out” the case being prepared against him, or to drop it, then “we are looking at that”.

Assange welcomed Obama’s decision to free Manning, after she was jailed for handing over classified documents to the anti-secrecy organisation.The outgoing US president used his final hours in the White House to allow Manning to go free nearly 30 years early.Assange also said the UK’s Crown Prosecution Service had refused to confirm or deny whether there was an extradition request from the US.Just moments before the conference, WikiLeaks tweeted the response l’Espresso journalist Stefania Maurizi received through Freedom of Information request:

Assange has been living in the Ecuadorian embassy since the summer of 2012 for fear of being extradited to the US.He was interviewed in the embassy in November in the presence of prosecutors from Sweden, where he faces a sex allegation.He denies the claims, but insists he faces extradition to the United States for questioning over the activities of WikiLeaks if he leaves the embassy.